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- IperionX (IPX) partners with US-based Carver Pump to produce titanium pump components for the US Navy
- Under the partnership, Carver will design the titanium pump components and use IperionX’s technologies to 3D print the parts
- IPX says titanium pumps are regarded highly by the Navy for their corrosion resistance and are used across all major pump applications
- IperionX’s patented technologies offer a pathway to lower-cost, lower-carbon, US-manufactured titanium components for use across a range of industries
- IPX shares are down 0.6 per cent and trading at 82.5 cents at 1:02 pm AEDT
Dual-listed titanium developer IperionX (IPX) has partnered with US-based Carver Pump to produce titanium pump components for the US Navy.
IperionX will give access to its patented titanium technologies to Carver, who will design the titanium pump components, guide IperionX on prototyping, and lead the qualification of the titanium pump components for the Navy.
Carver has manufactured specialised high-performance centrifugal pumps for the Navy since World War II. The company has supplied to every major US Navy shipbuilding program for the past 60 years.
IperionX said titanium pumps were regarded highly by the Navy for their corrosion resistance and were used across all major pump applications, with titanium components generally manufactured through titanium casting methods.
The pumps are used for a number of purposes by the Navy, including fire suppressions, seawater cooling, main propulsion seawater, bilge and desalination.
For some time now, the nation has struggled without a domestic capacity to manufacture high-performance large titanium castings, which has led to long waits for new pump components sourced from a foreign-controlled supply chain that uses high-cost and carbon-intensive titanium metal.
IperionX’s lower-cost, lower-carbon, US titanium powders will go towards additively manufacturing the pump components, offering reduced wait times for critical parts, increasing equipment availability and sustainably re-shoring a critical US titanium metal supply chain.
IperionX CEO Taso Arima said it was another step in the right direction for the company.
“Our partnership with Carver is another important milestone for the rapid commercialisation of IperionX’s breakthrough titanium technologies,” Mr Arima said.
For some time, the Governor of Virginia and the US Navy have been accelerating efforts to scale additive manufacturing, having opened the ‘Additive Manufacturing Center of Excellence’ in Danville Virginia, just 25 miles (40km) from the site of IperionX’s new titanium demonstration facility in South Boston, Virginia.
“As they [IperionX] continue to develop synergies with Carver Pump and the US Navy using 100-per-cent recycled titanium scrap as feedstock, which will soon be produced in Halifax County, we look forward to seeing IperionX’s continued growth and success,” the Governor of Virginia, Glenn Youngkin, said.
“This puts Virginia on the map for providing a critical material that is essential for our advanced industries including those exhibited just down the road at the US Navy’s Additive Manufacturing Center of Excellence.”
IPX shares were down 0.6 per cent and trading at 82.5 cents at 1:02 pm AEDT.
